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By: Eric A. Heath | October 21, 2016 - 2:59pm

On October 15, 2016, almost 200 countries endorsed the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol. According to the press release, the amendment will “reduce the emissions of powerful greenhouse gases, hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), in a move that could prevent up to 0.5 degrees Celsius of global warming by the end of this century.” The amendment calls for developed countries to start reducing their consumption of HFCs by 2019 and for developing countries to freeze their levels of HFCs by 2024 for some states and 2028 for others. Manufacturers have used HFCs to replace chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)—phased out under the Montreal Protocol—as refrigerants in a variety of products. The new amendment pledges the countries to provide funding for alternatives “that do not deplete the ozone layer and have a smaller impact on the climate, such as ammonia or carbon dioxide.”